


All Legends Fall In The Making

by nightfever



Category: Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Background Relationships, Blood and Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, Captain America: The First Avenger, Explicit Language, F/M, Gun Violence, Period Typical Attitudes, Period-Typical Racism, Period-Typical Sexism, Slow Burn, Time Travel, World War II
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-12
Updated: 2018-08-27
Packaged: 2019-06-26 12:41:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15663441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightfever/pseuds/nightfever
Summary: Whilst attempting to fix a prototype, most people don't expect to get sent back in time, let alone into their should-be-dead friend's past. Trapped in an anomaly and unsure of when they'll be extracted, one engineer tries to change opinions without changing the future while they learn how there past wasn't as different as they had thought.





	1. Welcome To The Rodeo

**Author's Note:**

> (Title taken from 'Legends' by Juice WRLD.)  
> (Chapter title also taken from 'Welcome To The Rodeo' by Lil Skies)  
> Wassup ya bitch back

Marcelline breezed down the steps, not even bothering to hold the handrail as she pitter-pattered her way down, humming. She had already gone down three floors and was counting the steps until she reached the gym level when Friday announced she was urgently needed in the lab, almost startling Marcelline down the last few steps. Pivoting, she wobbled slightly, sighed then began to make her way back upstairs. Scanning her keycard, Marcelline waltzed into the lab without regard for the urgency, enjoying the chill of the lab against her anxiety induced sweat dappled skin, immediately focusing on the buzzing and electrical crackling sound of broken wires.

"I knocked over some acid and when I went to catch it, it melted the side of your prototype," Tony explained as Marcelline removed a side panel to inspect the wiring.

“How far are you with the prototype?” Tony inquired, searching for the upper cabinets for absorber pads,

“Uh, Geiger prototype is up and running and I’m currently in testing phase one - Didn't I tell you? I made a steel lump,” Marcelline replied, making a huffy noise when Tony said she hadn't. She stepped over the pool of acid and into the machine, continuing, “I’m already brainstorming names, though. If I don’t name it after myself I lose the chance to have something dedicated to me -” she gave a short and high pitched childish ‘owie’ as she shook out her hand, “But if I do, then I’d feel like a giant ego centric tit.” Marcelline asked for Dum-E to hand her a screwdriver, thanking the robot as she turned her attention to the unscrewing panel in front of her, regretting that she had forgotten to turn the machine off and hesitating as she considered stepping out to do just that, but she changed her mind, scoffing and asking herself quietly ‘ _ what’s the worst that could happen? Get turned to ash? Die? _ ’. Placing the panel by her feet, Marcelline eyed the wiring, trying to find the best way to the corroded patch of wires she had caught a glimpse of, resorting instead to prying the partially melted together clump of plastic and metal from the wall with the tip of the screwdriver.

 

As Marcelline tried to pull herself away, there was a crackle and a spark of electricity but her limbs felt frozen, possibly due to the hundreds of volts coursing through her body, she thought sarcastically, surprisingly calm despite being electrocuted and her body refusing to cooperate with her desire to stop being electrocuted. She tried to look for Tony, her eyes moving to where she had thought he was last, but she was distracted by the similarity of her predicament - it felt like being in a panic attack; thousands of tonnes weighing on your body, immobile but feeling crushed, pressure rising in your skull as hopefully enough brain cells popped to cause death. 

Despite being enough to cause fissures, Marcelline couldn't hear a single thump as Tony beat on the plexiglass to reach her. Even through the dissonance between her brain and body, Marcelline thought she might be able to feel the vibrations from the sheer force of Tony's efforts, at least she thought it was Tony as everything was blurry and she wondered vaguely if her eyes were leaking fluid and she was going blind. The strong metallic scent of metal that had singed her nose hairs had long since left her memory, probably burned out as Marcelline’s body began to shut down.

 

The feeling of density in her body increased rapidly, enough that Marcelline prayed there wasn’t a half breath left in her lungs, before the pressure suddenly left and her ears popped, painfully, although she was probably deafened by the thunder crackling in her ears. She noticed the feeling of free-falling, just in time to try to half brace herself to the impact. Having hardly caught her breath, there wasn't much to lose when Marcelline slammed into the ground. Groaning as she rolled onto her side, she almost didn't notice the cold seeping into her bones until she registered her wet clothes clinging to her burning skin - an aesthetic shot if she had a camera with her; pale reddened skin against cruddened snow.

 

Marcelline tried to focus, hoping that pulling her last brain cells together would help her understand the voices shouting  _ assumingly _ in her direction. She slowly staggered to her feet, using a log she had only just missed to help her up that she had mentally thanked for being a few inches to her left otherwise she would've broken something that could've killed her - she was only human after all.

 

Finally registering the shouting voices as German, Marcelline skimmed over her surroundings; around a campfire, with neutral coloured canvas triangular tens that she had only ever seen in olden style movies, were a group of soldiers.  She had tried to think of where they were from but to be honest, her history-buff brain had jumped to the conclusion of Nazi's, though to be realistic, the soldiers also could have been reenactors, and most likely were - wearing grey uniforms instead of camo, and greatly underdressed for the weather (she laughed sarcastically at herself mentally at this). But what reenactors would go to such depths to gain an understanding of  _ whatever _ when their lives are at risk?

 

Considering they were speaking German, it would make sense if they were German, but when a bullet, a _ real _ bullet, skimmed her shoulder Marcelline realised they weren't reenactors. Coming to the conclusion she may be right, Marcelline shoved any and all non-essential thoughts aside as she had more pressing concerns to focus on - like staying alive.

 

She raced to the man closest to her, a bullet just clipping her hip as she grabbed the wooden top of his rifle as she elbowed him in the face, snatching the gun from him to slam the butt into his head. When he staggered and dropped, Marcelline spun, aimed and shot the closest conscious man to her. Ignoring the clench of her stomach and the thick plumes of her breath in her face, Marcelline pulled back the bolt to release the casing, pushed the bolt forward and closed it, taking aim and firing again, repeating her actions when he didn't fall despite his injury. Apparently, the rifle had other ideas, and when it jammed, Marcelline resorted to using it as a blunt force object, namely a bat, until she could find another weapon.

 

Although she wouldn't be surprised if they were, Marcelline hoped her ears weren't permanently damaged. She also hoped the men firing at her continued to miss, enough so she could gather herself together to keep pushing through the cold, vaguely worried that soldiers were so badly trained they didn't know how to hit a half-trained nerd.

 

Slamming the rifle butt into another soldier's cheek before she push kicked him and stole his pistol, Marcelline steadied her hand on her wrist to fire at the next poor guy. Moving onto the next man, she moved close to avoid being shot, kicking the gun out of his hand and following with a knee to his groin and an elbow to the face.

Grabbing a long and thin but seemingly sturdy snow covered branch, Marcelline wielded it as her primary weapon, discarding the gun and ignoring the chill burning her hand as she advanced towards the remaining three soldiers. She brought the stick down onto Numero Uno's head, the mock weapon bending under the force of the action, then took a short step back and brought the bottom half of the stick up to his groin, spinning from right to left to build momentum and smack the second to last soldier to the ground from the force of the attack.

 

The final guy, Cutie McNiceEyes, grabbed the stick when Marcelline aimed for his side, blocking the hit and stepping forward to step with a left hook, which she blocked him with her forearm. As she readied herself to cut kick him in the head, hoping she didn't lose her footing in the snow. He caught her leg,  just as it reached his shoulder so Marcelline decided to change tactics and bent her knee, hoping she had the angle right as she pushed off, wrapping her legs together and crossing her ankles behind the young man's back, squeezing her thighs together as he eventually let go of her leg. Using her elbows, she hit him in the head until his frantic blows on her back with the stick he had snatched from her didn't have the same force and slowed down. Finally beaten, he fell to his knees, dopping to the ground. Marcelline took a shuddering breath, ignoring the cold as she tried to pull herself together, not even bothering to remove the unconscious man from between her thighs.

 

Somewhere ahead of her position, a stick snapped. Marcelline suddenly twisted, reaching and throwing herself at the fallen pistol on the ground, stumbling to her feet despite the desire to just lay down. Taking aim with her finger on the trigger at the man who had taken a step from the treeline,

"Ma'am?"

" _ Steve? _ "

She had ignored Dum Dum Dugan, who had originally spoken to her, although despite the state of shock she was in, she still cared about not being an asshole. Steve blanched, no doubt surprised by her recognition of him.

At least now Marcelline was one hundred percent sure that she had gone back in time. No room for errors, those were definitely Nazis, or HYDRA come to think of it, and Steve had definitely not recognised her, though she wouldn't expect him to as she was standing in front of him seventy years before his dip into the ice - seventy years before he leaves all his friends and family, seventy years before she meets him and seventy years before he gets Bucky back.

 

Marcelline definitely felt underdressed now, weather be damned, acutely aware of her clothes in a manner that wasn’t unfamiliar.

Having a second to just stop and think, Marcelline tried to hold back the nausea she only just pinpointed but gave up when her weary limbs swayed, instead opting to gesture to the men she had grown up idolising and turned herself away to vomit; her shoulders moving in a manner that looked painful from the force of the action. She was thankful that she didn't have much to get up but by the end of it, Marcelline felt better than she had before falling into a war and the throbbing of a migraine had subdued slightly. Ignoring the guilt of having just placed her lives over another and jumping over fifty years before her own birth, Marcelline tried to pull herself together.

She wasn't at all surprised to see the looks she was receiving , considering it was the nineteen-forties - something akin to the looks she usually got them from kids whenever she tried to dress up, often being called a magical creature like a fairy or some other

"Sorry that I look like a ho, but I'm from the future!" she called, numbly raising her arms and feeling her exposed midriff flare with warmth. Her teeth chattered and she wrapped her arms around herself, curling into to preserve warmth, though she wasn't quite sure what the point was considering she was soaked to her bones.

Steve and Dum Dum Dugan stepped forward, Bucky to Steve's right and lowering the gun that had been trained on her,

"Do all women look like that in the future?" Dernier asked, stepping through the snow to one of the bodies and returning to her with the warmest looking coat, which he handed to her with a flirtatious smile. Marcelline, as much as she wanted to, didn't have the energy to reply or even take the coat from him - instead closing her eyes and hunching in further.

Falsworth gently tugged her over to the fire, "She's going to freeze to death,"

Bucky didn't falter, stepping up to Marcelline and helping her to stand straight so he could slip her into the greatcoat he had taken from Dernier. Feeling numb and stiff but not wanting to complain, Marcelline complied before stomping over to the bodies, trying to avoid her feet getting any wetter than they currently were, to compare her shoes to the soldiers boots. She knew that people were smaller in the forties, so she was hoping that even with her ridiculously tiny feet, she could probably find something that would fit her. Eventually, the smallest pair of boots (which were almost two sizes too big, but it wasn’t so bad since she had ‘stolen’ socks from the kits of the deceased soldiers and they had fit somewhat more comfortably).

 

Marcelline remained silent, trying to plan answered responses to potential questions. She didn’t want to fuck up the timeline or cause a paradox where she was eaten by a giant ant - a recollection of a movie she had watched late night as a child. She couldn’t let Bucky know he was going to become a brainwashed assassin for over seventy years, changing the course of history one murder at a time, becoming HYDRA’s bitch and a shell of a man. Or Steve crashing being put on ice and waking to find all his friends are dead or dying, then having the organisation he ‘died’ for to have wormed inside of SHIELD.

“What are you thinking about?” Bucky questioned, jolting Marcelline out of her thoughts. She opened her mouth slightly, closing it before attempting to answer,

“Why do you trust me? How do you know I’m from the future and not some nut?”

Bucky shrugged, helping her shovel snow onto the fire, mirroring her as she moved the snow with her foot, “You look funny.”

Marcelline stopped, her nose scrunching up as she looked at him, “No - no! Not like that! You look  _ different _ to,” he paused, searching for an answer,

Morita handed Marcelline a blanket, “You don’t look like the average lady. You’re not rail thin, you’re tall - I’ve never seen anything  _ like _ what you’re wearing. And you didn’t bat an eye at Gabe and me being in the special forces,”

“Your hair!” Dernier added, “Is magnifique! But cover it up, it’s a target.”

Marcelline gave an embarrassed bob of her head, taking the helmet held out to her by Steve. She pulled her hair back into a ponytail, making smoothing motions with her hands before twisting the hair into a bun, though not before her bangs half popped up into a small tuft, which she held down to shove the helmet onto her head, giving it a good  _ pat _ for extra measure.

“Even the way you talk and your mannerisms, they’re nothing like a forties woman.”

“So how would I fit in?” Marcelline asked, beginning to unbutton her coat, “I’m going to need to be coached or whatever because I don’t know how long it might take for me to be retrieved.”

Noticing that she only had the shirt she had arrived in, Gabe commented “You still only have that?” as she started to wrap yourself up in the blanket Morita had handed her. Steve moved quickly to her, unbuttoning a creased shirt as he walked,

“Blanket off,” he ordered. Marcelline cocked a brow,

“Movin’ kinda quick, there, Stevie,” she smiled cockily, though she obliged nonetheless. Steely eyed, Steve focused on buttoning Marcelline’s shirt, helping her rewrap herself in the scratchy blanket and shrug the greatcoat on, which she had buttoned all the way up to the collar like Bucky had done. Marcelline didn’t miss how the Commandos huddled around Morita, who looked to be telling them something serious.

Gabe helped her with the backpack, which Marcelline reckoned was probably more than a third of her weight, asking about what life was like in the future,

“Uh,” Marcelline scrambled her brain to think about something they would be interested in hearing - after all, most of the things she lived through happened after theirs ended.

“Equal rights? Mostly during the sixties but there’s stuff that happens after that - essentially, if I’m recalling this correctly, there was an act passed in sixty-four-sixty-eight that prohibits discrimination based on race, religion, sex, or wherever you’re originally from - bye bye segregation,” Marcelline shrugged.

“I mean, there’s still shit people get for being different but I think societally, people are looking at what’s happening and saying ‘yeah, nah, that’s unacceptable’ and trying to bring about change. But I can’t really comment since I’m not really on both sides of the bandwagon - I grew up in London, which is known for being a hub of multiculturalism. Like if I walk down the street depending on the area, the majority aren’t white-British,”

“When’s this?” Dugan asked, lighting a cigar,

“Since, like, the nineties,” Marcelline felt like she was lying, not mentioning the downfalls like how her brothers and the boys in her area were treated, but it was technically a lie of omission. “I mean, my mum still complains but it’s not really anything bad. She’s just mad there’s so many foreigners -” Steve let out an annoyed huff, “Because she doesn’t feel special anymore. She came to England in the nineties so it was still white majority, but now there’s so many non-white people she’s annoyed she doesn’t stand out.”

Marcelline hadn’t noticed the decline in visibility as the sun began to dip below the horizon. The sky was now a dark greyish-blue, and Steve stopped in a small clearing,

“This is a good place to set up camp,”

“Ya know, it’s kinda weird that I’m currently existing before my own birth. That’s pretty rad,” Marcelline paused then visibly shuddered, “Actually I take that back, I’m going to have an existential crisis.”  
  



	2. The Whatterfly Effect?

A pungent scented ‘burning’ smell tinged Bucky’s nose, strong enough to cause the lightheadedness he felt, he considered for a moment. He immediately recalled what had happened, pushing himself to get up and assess the damage despite the throbbing in his skull and the dizziness trying to pull him back down.  
Bucky helped Tony up, calling FRIDAY to call for medical assistance as he took in Tony’s appearance. Gravitating toward the machine stood in the back of the lab, Bucky scanned for Marcelline, knowing he wouldn’t find her.  
Tony’s voice cracked as he called for the young woman, bubbling with hysteria when he didn’t receive a response,  
“Tony - Tony,” Bucky paused, “She’s not here.”  
The door slid open as he said this, Natasha and Sam spilling in, confusion written across their faces as they asked what happened,  
“Marcelline’s prototype malfunctioned. What - what do you mean she’s not here? Where is she?” Tony rounded on Bucky, whose shoulders deflated as he sighed,  
“It’s a bit tricky to explain,” he began, “I think she went back in time.”  
“Went back in time how?” Sam asked, Tony continuing to look at Bucky with a mix of confusion and disbelief,  
“And how do you know she time travelled?” Natasha added, voice filled with disbelief but helping Bucky move onto his next point,  
“Because I knew her in nineteen-forty-four,” Bucky sighed again, staring helplessly around the lab as two part-time nurses trickled into the room. “She left lil’ notes and signs for us to find her,”  
“Like this,” Steve placed a laptop on the workbench beside Tony, who was being checked over by the smaller of the two whilst the other tended to the cut on the back of Bucky’s head. Steve had pulled up a collection of files, from mission reports to lab statements and official SSR documents, starting from nineteen forty-four and all including some mention of ‘PHD’. Natasha didn’t believe what she was seeing, continuing to skim files until she reached a black and white photo, dated nineteen forty-four, of Marcelline (unmistakably her Marcelline) with the Howling Commandos holding up her hands near her chest, similarly to how she held them when she ‘nico nico nii’d her way around the compound to spite everyone; though Natasha was even more thankful when she realised she could’ve actually posed ‘properly’ and hold up her hands like cat ears.  
“That’s -” Sam trailed off, “What? How are we gonna get her back? Why is she posing like that? She knows we hate it,”  
Choosing to ignore the weeb bashing (not that it didn’t need to happen, it just that he found it funny to imagine Marcelline explaining to people who had never even heard of the concept of manga what ‘nico nico nii’ meant) Tony explained, beginning to pace “We need to find out what caused her to go back in the first place, then find a way to recreate and stabilize the anomaly,”  
Natasha folded her arms, “And we do that how?”  
“FRIDAY, call Jane Foster tell her there’s been a temporal shift, most likely involving an Einstein-Rosen bridge,” Tony said as way of explanation, “Then scan the lab for the past hour for anything out of the ordinary.”  
The lab was silent momentarily before the nurses briefly told Bucky and Tony the extent of their injuries and left, leaving the group to think.

Almost seventy-five years previously, Marcelline perched on a log, leaning towards the campfire in an attempt to absorb as much warmth as possible without turning herself into a human sacrifice.  
“I can take first and second watch,” Marcelline offered, “It’s -” she paused, tapping her smartwatch, “Ten thirty-ish for me anyway, so it’s not like I’m gonna sleep.” Recalling the fact the tech was nowhere near contemplation, she took it off and handed it to Morita, who was sitting beside her.  
“This is a watch?” Morita questioned, dumbfounded as he turned the watch in his hands and awed when Marcelline instructed him to press the button on the side and the screen lit up.  
“Have a fiddle with it. It connects to my phone so it alerts me when I have a call or a text when I don’t have it on me - it’s kind of a personal assistant in a way because I can set a reminder or put something in my calendar and it’ll buzz and tell me I have an appointment, or give me directions,”  
“It tells you directions?” Dugan echoed,  
“I don’t have wifi so it probably won’t work, but I’ll try and show you,” Marcelline said, snow crunching underfoot as she went to collect the watch. She turned the volume up and cleared her throat slightly, “FRIDAY, which way is London?”  
“I’m sorry, Miss. Wazowski,” came the robotic response, “But you aren’t currently connected to the network,”  
“What would happen if you were connected to the network?” Steve asked,  
“If I was, then my location would be pinpointed and FRIDAY would tell me how to get to wherever I want to go,”  
“Does it do anything else?” Gabe questioned, tasting from the pot over the fire.  
Marcelline explained, vaguely distracted by the scent floating on the cold air, to the best of her ability - stating that it was a functioning fourth gen prototype that had a few bugs to work out before being given to the rest of the team and giving as much information as she could on how it actually worked. It was mostly Morita who understood where she was coming from, occasionally asking for clarification when she mentioned something he was unfamiliar with,  
“Is everyone this smart in the future?” Bucky inquired, softly smiling,  
“Uh - uh, I guess? Schooling has definitely gotten harder, ya know, with the whole ‘kids gotta be smarter than you’ thing but most people don’t know much about their tech unless they work in the tech development industry or specifically work with the company that sells them,”  
Steve filled his canteen cup with soup, “You work with tech?”  
“Yeah, but I don’t work specifically with the company that manufactures these, though, I work with the SSR in tech development,” Marcelline shook her head when Steve gestured for her to pass her canteen cup, “I’m not that hungry,”  
“You need to eat something, Marcelline,” Dernier urged, “You gotta keep warm - we can’t have you travel backwards in time and die just when we’re getting to know you,”  
“I never said I wasn’t going to eat, I just don’t want soup,” she replied, grabbing the jam jar and inspecting the label, “Stachelbereen,”  
Gabe paused, “I think you mean ‘stachelbeeren’?”  
“Is that not what I said?” Marcelline scrunched her nose slightly, slicing the loaf of bread Morita had been sharing with Falsworth with the knife she had taken from latter without asking. Gabe shook his head as she spread a thin layer on the equally thin slice,  
“Nowhere near close,” he answered,  
“I guess that’s proof we win the war,” Dugan said with a laugh, Morita rolling his eyes,  
“We win the war, right?”  
Marcelline gave an embarrassed shrug, “Maybe,”  
“Maybe? How do we maybe win the war?” Falsworth turned to her fully, cocking a brow,  
“I don’t want to answer because it probably messes with the spacetime continuum,” she said, pulling a face as she gestured,  
“Knowing who wins to war messes with the future?” Falsworth repeated,  
“I said probably!” Marcelline argued, her voice cracking slightly as it rose, ”I don’t know for sure but if knowing has an effect it’s the butterfly effect - thinking you know when the war ends pushes you to either do or refuse to do things that have an affect on the future,”  
“What’s this ‘butterfly effect’?” Dernier questioned,  
“I’m not sure if it’s been theorised yet but essentially it’s the theory that even the littlest thing has an impact in the grand scheme of things. Like a butterfly flapping its wings - in a few weeks that singular flap may have been the cause of a hurricane. I don’t want to say we win or lose the war or even mention battles that are probably currently going on because I don’t want to feel like I’ve just extended the war or caused the death of someone that isn’t supposed to die, which I know is highly unlikely but I’m just an anxious guy.”  
There was silence for a few moments, Marcelline hoping they ignored the fact she had flapped her arms to imitate a butterfly and the fact she placed her own guilt above whether or not they knew to say goodbyes to their families, “But on lighter topics, tell me all your crazy shenanigans! I’ve always loved reading about what you guys did - but to hear it first hand,” she shook her head, unable to find a comparison or something to express how grateful and excited she felt.

Later that night, after warmth blossomed in Marcelline’s chest from laughter at her now friends antics, they had began to say their good nights as they trickled off one by one. Eventually, it had come down to a pair; both initially quiet although they had found a common interest in technology. Feeling award in the silence, Marcelline tipped her head back to observe the stars,  
“I love seeing stars,” she grinned, “I had never actually seen a sky full of stars until I was,” she blew out a breath, “Fourteen, maybe? There’s so much light pollution in the city I thought it would be impossible, then one day I looked up as I was leaving a friends house and all I could see were stars just painted across the sky - it was amazing,”  
Bucky smiled, sharing the feeling as he watched her marvel in her wonderment. He himself hadn’t seen the stars until he was in basic, away from the hustle and bustle of cities that marred the speckles of light with their plumes of smoke and lights that sought to steal the stars’ grandeur. Unfortunately, the current global crisis had stricken him from his own awe of the constellations; every night under stars was another day the war ravaged on, claiming countless lives. Occasionally, though, he caught himself tilting his head back to stargaze, if only to thank God for keeping him safe for another day, and getting lost in the constellations.  
“When I was a kid, I wanted to be an astronomer and just study the sky - now I’m kinda sad I didn’t,” Marcelline said, letting out a chuckle,  
“What do you do now?” Even the most mundane details would help Bucky picture the future, whether it was common professions or a daily routine.  
“I’m a mechanical engineer; I help design weapons and field gadgets for the SSR and trying to create things that help the world - kinda why I’m here,” she ended with a sarcastic huff of laughter. Not seeing how those two tied together, Bucky furrowed his brows,  
“How far from the future exactly are you?”  
“At least seventy years. I don’t know what year it is to be giving you specifics,”  
“It’s forty-four. Seventy years that’s - two thousand? And you - are you the first person to time travel?” Bucky found himself more intrigued by how she had come to jump the time, pushing aside his desire to know of the years to come.  
Marcelline recalled all the time travel theories and some of the evidence, “Maybe? There’s a few theories and some evidence out there but I might be the first person. The worst bit was I wasn’t even trying to make a time machine, I just got sent back because it malfunctioned and there’s a chance it might not even be working because of it.”   
“So how are you going to get home?” Bucky imagined himself in her shoes, which wasn’t too hard since he could relate to being trapped without a surefire way to get back home. She was stuck with outdated technology, some of which she had probably never seen let alone heard of, where she risked destroying the future as she knew it if she slipped and mentioned something she shouldn’t have.  
Marcelline was walking a fine with the future as she knew it in her hands.  
“I don’t know - I just hope I actually can go home. I’m counting on my friends being able to bring me back but if they can’t -” Marcelline shrugged unapologetically, “Then I guess I gotta hash a life out for myself here, contribute to society. You know, it’d be pretty weird if I settled down and had kids because my grandma is probably alive right now,” Marcelline finished with an embarrassed huff of air,  
“Monty probably knows her,” Bucky realised with a laugh, lightening the mood. “What’re the odds we’ve met her?”  
Realising his game, Marcelline gave a small smile and shrug for his efforts, knowing they were most likely (read: one hundred percent) in vain,  
“Not very high, unless you’ve been to north-easterny Africa or somewhere in Poland but we probably - aren’t in Poland.” She had almost let slip that she didn’t think they reached Poland until Spring or some time then, and for dramatic effect, Marcelline loudly sniffed, “You smell that? That’s the smell of a cold-ass winter in western Europe - this don’t smell like east Europe and I’ll eat my boot if I’m wrong.”  
Leaning forward, Bucky stared Marcelline dead in the eye, “You’re wrong,”  
“No you’re not,” Falsworth said, stumbling out of his and Morita’s shared tent and behind the treeline, “Don’t make the poor girl eat her boot.”

 

Eventually, Marcelline had been left alone with only flickering light and her thoughts. Prior to heading to his tent, Bucky had tossed a few pieces of wood onto the fire, though the flames were beginning to dim again and Marcelline doubted the fire would keep burning to sunrise. The stash that had been collected didn’t look like it could suffice the flames hunger by Marcelline’s reckoning but to be fair, she never had to stoke a fire and had never actually seen a campfire in person. Standing, Marcelline shook off the feeling of being watched and stepped into the treeline, scanning as she walked for logs and internally wondering if wendigos and skinwalkers were native to North America or happened to prowl Europe too. Collecting the wood she thought she might need, Marcelline returned back to the dimming light of the fire and settled down for the rest of the night.

**Author's Note:**

> To be fair, I'm not sure if I'm happy with this, so don't be surprised if I edit it somehow. But it does feel really great to be back and I can't wait to get back into regularly writing


End file.
